You were always quiet
I was always cold
Walking there beside you
Promises were gold
So I moved a little closer
But you took a step away
And the world that was between us has gone away

Now a new voice guides me
And on the way back home
Everything behind me is turning into stone

Three months later.

83 days, in actual fact.

He'd almost entirely disappeared off the face of the planet to a place where parts of her might also have been found.

Somewhere cold and dark, one could only guess.

She'd heard in a roundabout way that he'd completely dropped out of school. As a result, the building had become some sort of safe-house. Refuge.

While others, in the midst of such personal tragedy, would have let everything around them become a shambles, Faye was excelling in all her classes and applying to schools abroad. Schools she'd never have imagined she'd ever be considered by, let alone be considering. Her scores had always been great. Now they were phenomenal.

While her family and teachers were happy that her future seemed to be mapped out in only the brightest stars, they couldn't help but know that her future seemed to be the last thing on her mind. The only days ahead she seemed to care for were those that may occur as far away from here as possible.

So she locked herself away in classrooms and libraries. Her father's study where she occupied a corner on the long, leather couch bolstered by book cases, surrounded by applications and pamphlets for various universities and colleges as far as America, some in Australia. She'd pour over course calendars, what little remained of her heart warmed by the sounds of her father typing or conducting brief conference calls with an occasional glance over his shoulders and a small smile only she could understand and be somewhat comforted by.

Her mother tried to engage her in Ezekiel-related conversation only once.

Faye's mouth remained drawn and unyielding but all the while her eyes seemed to speak volumes.

Telling tales of a living dead girl.

A story so sad her mother couldn't bear to sit through it a second time.

So long ago, Faye gave up hating him. She gave it up for hating herself. And then she let all of it go at once like dry sand from her fingers taken away with winds of approaching summer. She mourned the loss of so much of herself that seemed to leave with the hate, with the memory of Ezekiel. It left behind only scraps of Faye, but enough of the shell of the girl she once was that she could still feel the heartbreak.

There was enough of her left behind to pack up and leave this place.

When Faye was awarded a memorial grant offered by the school board for top honours, her friends, whom she had sorely neglected these past couple of months, used this as an excuse to get her out to celebrate. She came up with every reason possible to stay in but her shriveled heart still had enough beats in it left to feel bad about shutting her friends out and punishing them for simply wearing the same uniform Ezekiel had worn.

She tried to smile for her friends as they played with her hair and tugged her chin about to line her eyes or redden her lips with various shades of lipstick, powders and paints. She felt so phony, the smile feeling like a waxy bit of a Halloween costume, but she guessed she was doing a good enough job at masking the inner turmoil, the anxiety attack she felt was brewing in her burning stomach at the thought of leaving her home and potentially running into Ezekiel.

When she peered at the flyer Agatha and Sally fought over to read the address of the bar they'd decided to hit, she could make out the names of several bands that would be playing that night to raise money for some college radio station. They all had ridiculous names like Luscious LuLu, Dry Hump Sally, Spiderfarm and Nadsat.

Faye mentally prepared herself for a different kind of agony.

Lyrics from Papas Fritas' Beside You were used. Please don't sue.